Studies of small extracellular vesicles (sEVs), known as exosomes, have been flourishing in the last decade with several achievements, from advancing biochemical knowledge to use in biomedical applications. Physiological changes of sEVs due to the variety of cargos they carry undoubtedly leave an impression that affects the understanding of the mechanism underlying disease and the development of sEV-based shuttles used for treatments and non-invasive diagnostic tools. Indeed, the remarkable properties of sEVs are based on their nature, which helps shield them from recognition by the immune system, protects their payload from biochemical degradation, and contributes to their ability to translocate and convey information between cells and their inherent ability to target disease sites such as tumors that is valid for sEVs derived from cancer cells. However, their transport, biogenesis, and secretion mechanisms are still not thoroughly clear, and many ongoing investigations seek to determine how these processes occur. On the other hand, lead compounds have been playing critical roles in the drug discovery process and have been recently employed in studies of the biogenesis and secretion of sEVs as external agents, affecting sEV release and serving as drug payloads in sEV drug delivery systems. This article gives readers an overview of the roles of lead compounds in these two research areas of sEVs, the rising star in studies of nanoscale medicine.

中文翻译：

---

细胞外囊泡研究背景下的先导化合物。


过去十年，小细胞外囊泡（sEV）（即外泌体）的研究蓬勃发展，从推进生化知识到在生物医学应用中的应用，取得了多项成就。 sEV 因其携带的货物种类而产生的生理变化无疑会留下影响对疾病机制的理解以及用于治疗和非侵入性诊断工具的基于 sEV 的航天飞机的开发。事实上，sEV 的显着特性是基于它们的性质，这有助于保护它们免受免疫系统的识别，保护它们的有效负载免受生化降解，并有助于它们在细胞之间易位和传递信息的能力以及它们固有的针对疾病的能力对源自癌细胞的 sEV 有效的肿瘤等位点。然而，它们的运输、生物发生和分泌机制仍不完全清楚，许多正在进行的研究试图确定这些过程是如何发生的。另一方面，先导化合物在药物发现过程中发挥着关键作用，最近已作为外部制剂用于 sEV 的生物发生和分泌研究，影响 sEV 的释放并作为 sEV 药物输送系统中的药物有效负载。本文向读者概述了先导化合物在 sEV 的这两个研究领域中的作用，sEV 是纳米医学研究的后起之秀。